The Carbon Holdings of Northern Ecuador's Mangrove Forests

Within a geographic information systems environment, we combine field measures of mangrove tree diameter, mangrove species distribution, and mangrove tree density with remotely sensed measures of mangrove location and mangrove canopy cover to estimate the mangrove carbon holdings of northern Ecuador. We find that the four northern estuaries of Ecuador contain approximately 7,742,999 t (±15.47 percent) of standing carbon. Of particularly high carbon holdings are the Rhizophora mangle–dominated mangrove stands found in and around the Cayapas-Mataje Ecological Reserve in northern Esmeraldas Province, Ecuador, and certain stands of Rhizophora mangle in and around the Isla Corazon y Fragata Wildlife Refuge in central Manabi Province, Ecuador. Our field-driven mangrove carbon estimate is higher than all but one of the comparison models evaluated. We find that basic latitudinal mangrove carbon models performed at least as well, if not better, than the more complex species-based allometric models in predicting st...